1

Title and authors and affiliated institutions

2

Background

• Why was this study or audit undertaken?  What was the rationale behind it?
• Are there similar studies which have looked at the same question?
• Is there biological plausibility behind the study question?

3

Methods

• This is the most important section of the presentation, so make sure you understand exactly what it was that the authors did, and why they chose that particular way to do it.
• Think about what you might have done differently if you were trying to answer the same questions.

4

Statistics

• Everybody skips over this because they don’t understand statistics. You will never learn if you don't spend some time thinking about what the statistics mean.
  • Seek some senior support from someone who has some understanding of what statistics are used.
• Specifically for clinical trials, you should mention a sample size estimate as this determines whether they had the numbers to find a relevant difference.

5

Results

• Whilst this is the bit that everyone is interested in, be careful here, particularly if you think the methods are not good.  If the methods are flawed, the results have to be viewed with caution.
• It is best to sift out the important positive and negative findings, rather than mention them all.
• Are all the participants accounted for? What was the follow-up like?
• Did they look at any secondary outcomes which they did not have the power to find differences in?
• Were the incidences of events in the study groups the same as that which they based their power calculations on?

6

Discussion

• What are the limitations of the study?
• Have the findings been interpreted correctly by the authors?
• Is the study applicable to our or other populations?
• Should it change our practice?

7

Don't take it personally

• Finding an article, going through it in detail for a journal club, and presenting it takes a lot of time and effort.
• Sometimes an article you thought was good on reading the abstract does not hold true to that promise once it has been looked at closely.
• Often the collective opinion at the meeting is that the study has flaws (almost all studies do) but this does not mean that it was a bad article to present.  It is often easier to learn from studies which could have been better than to look at the (few and far between) high quality studies.